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REVIEW: The Hundred-Foot Journey

With the popularity of cooking shows and the fact that a chef can become an international celebrity, this film will attract that audience for sure. It's also a feel good movie about an Indian family who recently lost their matriarch and were relocate with their van and all their restaurant supplies. While driving through France their van broke down and needed parts for repair. Figuring it was destiny, they planted roots there and bought an abandoned old restaurant that happened to be 100 feet from the most successful French cuisine restaurant in the area. The reason it was abandoned was because every restaurant that opened there failed. Not good odds. A war breaks out between the Matriarch of the French restaurant and Patriarch of the Indian restaurant and the lengths they go to prevent the other from succeeding give us great comic relief.

The son, who's the main chef of the Indian restaurant, figures out a way to go to work for the French restaurant and his success there gets him noticed by Paris and he becomes an International superstar chef. But he longs for home and family, walks out on Paris life, and heads back to the woman he's fallen for, a fellow chef back in the small town where everything started. The indian Patriarch and French Matriarch, having both lost their spouses well before the movie started, seem to be getting closer as well.

That's my summation of the movie. BUT, it's a bit too long. And while it has some great moments and is funny at times, it needed something more. My 11 year old went with me and said, "I'm glad we came to this one!" She thought it was good but didn't give it a rating, and remember she just about gives everything 4 stars. The cinematography is breathtaking. I'll give it 2.5 stars overall.